People who take credit for other people’s success/ability/skill. Especially when, in doing so, they negate any role that person may have played in their own good fortune.

The two things that tend to specifically happen to me along these lines are:

Misdirect; and

Tricks of the Trade

For those who don’t tank/rogue/hunter, what those abilities do is transfer 100% of the threat generated by the rogue/hunter to the person who has the buff (always, always, always the tank. They can put it on someone else, but if they do it’s a swift, hard, kick from the party unless they’re pretty damn quick on their “Sorry! Sorry! Misclicked!” macro).

These buffs are short duration buffs with reasonable cooldowns (not sure how long. Probably somewhere from 1-3 minutes). Generally the rogue/hunter will use them on the initial pull, allowing them to go hog wild on the mob’s backside without fear of reprisal, and giving the tank an immediate boost to threat right off the bat.*

What seems to happen in the heads of the rogues and hunters I play with, is that I absolutely, 100% need to have Misdirect or Tricks of the Trade up, or I can’t tank. Like, the world ends, and I just won’t have enough threat, and the boss is going to run rampant through the line of clothies. All of a sudden the entirety of my tanking is solely creditable to them.

They have many different ways of saying this – of taking credit for someone else’s work/skill:

lololol this plce is cak wth tot

I’ll put Misdirect on the tank so they don’t lose the boss on the initial pull.

MD makes tanking easy

Here, let me give you Tricks. It’ll help your threat.

Let me be clear. These two abilities are very clever little things, that serve a variety of purposes. Also, when you’re tank, any threat is good threat, and it’s a case of literally the more the merrier. I’m always happy to take an MD or a ToT from someone because more distance between me and the DPS is great – and more specifically, since I seem to have more trouble with rogues and hunters than any other DPS class (it’s up to you to redeem the rogues, Sam – no pressure), I’m glad there’s a temporary buff that keeps them from getting themselves killed by wailing on shit before they’re supposed to (and don’t let them fool you – they’ll do it whether or not ToT or MD is up, and I’m telling you right now they have no idea where their Feint/Vanish/Disengage/Feign Death button is). And, to be bluntly honest, tanks who are new, or still rough around the edges, will benefit immensely from it.

But the line that I’m drawing here is that whatever benefit those two abilities provide to me is a bonus – not the actual purpose of the buff. The actual purpose of the buff isn’t to increase my threat generation (because how many times do I have to tank for you assholes to prove I don’t need the help), but to lower theirs. It’s a piece of candy that means they can start DPSing right away instead of having to wait for the tank to establish aggro. And I swear to God, it takes me no time at all to establish aggro – at least not on either the warrior or the paladin.

In the two seconds it takes me to pull on the pally, I’ve thrown an Avenger’s Shield to start, then run in and bashed their heads in with SoR or HoR and dropped a consecrate. No, seriously, go to town (intelligently). I’m good. I’ve got them. With or without your threat-transfer.

In the 1.5 seconds it takes me to pull on my warrior I’ve down a Heroic Throw, charge, and a fucking Shield Bash (and probably a Heroic Strike) to their face and now I’m happily spamming my priority list. No, seriously, look at Omen. Boss isn’t going nowhere. I’ve got plenty of time between that initial pull and the DPS really ramping up to well and truly establish myself. And I don’t need a threat-transfer to do it.

Don’t throw in little comments after the fight about how much threat you gave me and how much easier it made everything.

You want to know the honest to God truth?

I didn’t notice a difference. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. I was a little higher on Omen right off the bat, and you took a little longer to get your trigger-happy ass creeping up the threat bars, that’s all. These are good, solid, benefits that have good, solid consequences, and I’m glad they’re there.

But I wouldn’t have lost the boss if I didn’t have them.

And I most certainly don’t need them to establish aggro or tank.

If I did a good job tanking, I did a good job tanking – not you. Not you for me. Not you as a pillar of my tanking strategy, without which all of the skill and practice and experience I’ve built up over the last half a freaking decade falls to ash and I am become little more than a shitty DPS.

ToT and MD don’t allow me to tank – they allow you to DPS more freely and more quickly. They increase your DPS. That’s what they’re for. They’re not for making sure I don’t lose the boss, because I can do that without your help, and I don’t appreciate you distilling my efforts down and claiming that you pushing a single button is the reason I’m able to do my job.

And this attitude shows itself in other places. I rant about MD and ToT because they’re a sore spot and I’m constantly bashing my head against them. But it happens a lot on the DPS side, too.

A couple nights ago layteknight was in a raid on her AFF Lock, and there was a Destro Lock in the party. Naturally, she was riding high on the DPS metres, sitting pretty in the number one spot. Now, of course no one links the DPS metres unless they’re at the top, and layte’s not the type of person who feels the need to link them to prove she’s awesome. She knows she’s awesome, and honestly, she knows all the other DPS have Recount too. They can see who’s at the top.

That’s why they’re not linking the metres, after all.

So SaveTheFails, being SaveTheFails, links them on her behalf, since it pisses us off that people will link them at the end of every boss fight if they’re at the top, but otherwise “forget” to – so any bullshit about using the metres to improve their DPS or analyze anything is just that – bullshit. It’s a means of waving around various masculine body parts in an attempt to…I don’t know. Alpha male the room or something?

And oh my God, as Recount spams the chat window the excuses start flying. “It’s because I was on the adds.” “This raid favours locks.” “I just changed specs so I’m still rusty.” And so on and so forth ad nauseum.

Never does anyone say, “hey, nice job, layte. Killer DPS, grats on topping” because…they’re asshats, I guess. Anyway, through all this prattle, the Destro lock pops up with:

“You’re welcome.”

As though he is solely responsible for her DPS. I guess he’d been throwing Curse of Elements around on the mobs during the raid, and somehow this one buff – that provides as much benefit (if not more) to him and the mages/shaman as to layte – is the only reason she topped the metres.

Nevermind that she’s good at what she does.

Nevermind that she plays the most difficult spec in probably the whole game and plays it flawlessly.

Nevermind that she spends obscene amounts of time trying to optimize her gear and spec and rotation.

Nevermind that the buff in question applies to all casters equally and therefore even without it, they all would have been sitting in the same position relative to each other anyway, and layte still would have been at the top.

He pressed one button, one time. He did it to increase his own DPS, and if the raid’s damage went up overall, hey. That’s a bonus!

But because of that one button, all of layte’s work and skill and knowledge gets distilled down and he takes credit for the whole shebang. With two little words.

Not “Grats, layte!”

But “You’re welcome.”

How about next time I’m in a raid, I take credit for all the melee DPS’ damage. After all, I’m dropping sunders like candy as part of my button smashing. Obviously that single buff is the only reason they’re doing as well as they’re doing, right?

Oh, and hey. While I’m at it, I dropped a Feast at the start of the fight. Shit, that benefits casters too, doesn’t it? So all of their DPS is obviously mine as well. They’d never be able to do that much if it weren’t for the buff I gave them.

Healers too. That Feast buff is powerful, man. Full credit to me for their epic heals. 35 spell power is a lot, man. A lot. Plus, I mean, if it weren’t for Demo shout they’d never be able to heal through the bosses damage. It’s critical, man. They’d better be grateful I’m here or they’d never be able to do anything.

All you bitches had better be grateful, man. I’m carrying this raid. If it weren’t for me, you’d be nothing. You couldn’t even raid. You need my sunders and my feasts and my thunderclap and Demo shout. If you didn’t have me, you’d never be able to do anything. Everybody knows that your knowledge of your class and your skill and your reaction time mean jack in the face of my buff to your AP, SP, and STA.

Fear my Feasts, you noobs! Without them you are nothing.

Pfffft.

*UPDATE FOR CLARIFICATION: Samuel Tempus has written a response and clarification of the way Tricks of the Trade actually works (and I believe it’s described in the comments as well). I should have equipped the post with a disclaimer – I am not a rogue. He actually is. I’m willing to bet he knows more about it than me (but don’t tell him I said so). It’s apparently a more useful ability than I gave it credit for, and I’m intrigued by the idea of trading it with another rogue – very clever tactic. But I maintain that I don’t need it to tank. ^^